[niteowl77]

Another factor was that U.S forces were physically and emotionally exhausted by long hard fighting, and hac very little tolerance for or patience with misunderstandings caused by language barriers. It is really a lot easier to shoot a prisoner than search him, and escort him to the rear.

It happened in the ETO as well, and in that case, there were a fair number of Americans who spoke some German and Germans who spoke some English. The Germans were all over the place when it came to behavior- some of them had no compunction about shooting medics, etc, while others were "correct" to the point where they put themselves on the line. When Germans went past the established boundaries, they generally got it back good and hard.

(Incidentally, about a year before my dad passed away he told me about a situation involving an ETO vet uncle that touched on some of the points brought up in this thread. Dad did not tell me how it ended - I don't know if my uncle actually ever told him the ending - but there was no good outcome possible.)

Mr. niteowl77

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

General Omar Bradley famously said that he was sick and tired of hearing reports of German snipers surrendering. The Germans would leave small contingents to cover their retreat, and when their ammunition ran out they would surrender. It was an effective tactic for the Germans. One ETO vet I knew well said that after Malmedy they did not take SS prisoners, and German troops who surrendered with an empty magazine were ordered to "run for it", though they never got far.

I don't know about "take them to the rear" being a dog whistle for "shoot them". For one thing, prisoners can be a valuable source of intelligence. (Many Japanese who surrendered were seething with resentment towards their officers, and willingly gave as much information they could.) The following snippet is from the memoirs of Major Dick Winters (Band of Brothers) T/5 Leibgott's parents were Austrian, and he spoke fluent German. He hated Nazis so badly that his fellow soldiers assumed he was Jewish, which he was not.

My casualties were one man dead and four wounded. Tech/5 Joseph D. Liebgott had been slightly wounded in the arm, but he was ambulatory so I assigned him the mission of escorting seven German prisoners to the rear. Liebgott had earned the reputation of being one of Easy’s best combat soldiers, but we had all heard stories that he was very rough on prisoners. Liebgott was one of Easy Company’s killers, so I deemed it appropriate to take a bit of caution. When he heard me say, “Take the prisoners back to the battalion command post,” he replied, “Oh boy! I’ll take care of them.” In his exuberance Liebgott stood up and paced back and forth and he was obviously very nervous and concerned.

I stopped him in his tracks. “There are seven prisoners and I want seven prisoners turned over to battalion.”

Liebgott was highly incensed and started to throw a tantrum. Somewhat unsure of how he would react, I then dropped my M-1 to my hip, threw off the safety, and said, “Liebgott, drop all your ammunition and empty your rifle.” There was much grumbling and swearing, but he did as I had ordered. “Now,” I said, “you can put one round in your rifle. If you drop a prisoner, the rest will jump you.” One of the German prisoners, an officer, evidently understood this exchange. After he understood my orders, he relaxed and sat down. Liebgott returned seven prisoners to battalion headquarters that day—I personally checked with Nixon.